Experimentally Derived Sedimentary, Molecular, and Isotopic Characteristics of Bone-Fueled Hearths Abstract Molecular and isotopic analysis of sediments from archaeological combustion features is a relatively new area of study. Applications can inform us about ancient pyro-technologies and patterns of animal exploitation in a wide range of human contexts, but may be particularly informative with regard to ancient hunter-gatherers. Our analyses of sediments from experimental bone and wood fires, and from controlled laboratory heating sequences, provide fine-grained data on the formation and location of biomarkers from pyrolyzed animal fats in hearths. Integrating microstratigraphic, molecular, and isotopic data can improve recognition of bone fires in archaeological contexts, perhaps even where bone preservation is poor. Experimental bone fires produced an upper layer of calcined bone above a thin layer of tarry black amorphous material coating mineral sediments. Mineral sediments beneath the black layer showed little alteration but high lipid content. Sampling for molecular and isotopic analysis should target the black layer as the bulk of pyrolyzed biomarkers are located here and stable isotope values are less affected than in the overlying layer of ash or calcined bone. The combined presence of certain symmetric and slightly asymmetric saturated long-chain ketones (14-nonacosanone, 16-hentriacontanone 16-tritriacontanone, and 18-pentatriacontanone), especially together with heptadecane (C17n-alkane), are molecular indicators of the thermal degradation of terrestrial animal fat. Formation and relative dominance of these molecules in hearth sediments relates to the initial prevalence of specific precursor fatty acids and can provide broad separations between sources. We suggest that separations could be further supported and expanded by combining stable isotope analysis of the same compounds.

Assumptions and Protocol of the Taxonomic Identification of Faunal Remains in Zooarchaeology: a North American Perspective Abstract Identification of the species of animal represented by ancient bones, teeth, and shells based on the size and shape of those materials is one of the most fundamental and foundational steps in paleozoology, yet only scattered comments in the literature regarding this matter have been published. The history of taxonomic identification of faunal remains began with researchers learning which anatomical traits were taxonomically diagnostic; this required the creation of reference collections of skeletons of known taxonomy. To identify the taxon of animal represented by an ancient bone or tooth or shell requires comparison between the taxonomically unknown and reference materials of known taxonomy. The key assumption underpinning taxonomic identification is that anatomical similarity in size and shape of a reference bone and a paleozoological bone signifies genetic similarity and, thus, taxonomic similarity. Reference collections must be large both in terms of the number of species represented and the number of skeletons per species. Anatomical traits are morphological (qualitative), metric (quantitative), and meristic (frequency). Reporting of the identification protocol followed, including the reference skeletons, illustrated guides, and anatomical traits used, is strongly recommended so that what are believed to be taxonomically diagnostic traits can be tested and either used, revised, or discarded by others. An online database listing what are believed to be taxonomically diagnostic traits will increase efficiency, enhance accuracy of identifications, and should prompt re-identification of collections studied in the past.

Late Precolonial Culinary Practices: Starch Analysis on Griddles from the Northern Caribbean Abstract Late precolonial (c. 800–1500 CE) culinary practices in the northern Caribbean have received limited investigations. Determining foodways has been integral for the study of cultures, yet there has never been a comparison of foodway dynamics in the Caribbean between the Greater Antilles (the presumed origin of people who migrated into The Bahamas) and the Bahama archipelago. The objective of our study was to analyze microbotanical residues (starches) extracted from 45 clay griddles (food preparation platters) to illuminate a partial view of the phytocultural repertoire of this region and explicate variations of the identified culinary practices. The griddles were excavated from three archaeological sites: El Flaco and La Luperona in northwestern Dominican Republic and Palmetto Junction on the western coast of Providenciales, Turks & Caicos Islands. Regarding the production of plant-based food on griddles, our produced data suggests that the people who lived at El Flaco focused on the production of maize (Zea mays L.) derivatives, La Luperona residents prepared guáyiga/coontie/zamia (Zamia spp.) food products, and Palmetto Junction ostensibly had a focus on the production of manioc (Manihot esculenta Crantz) based foods. This survey of foodways has exposed particular cultural niches, different adaptation strategies, and associated culinary practices.

The Identity of Potters in Early States: Determining the Age and Sex of Fingerprints on Early Bronze Age Pottery from Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath, Israel Abstract The organization of craft production has long been a marker for broader social, economic, and political changes that accompanied urbanism. The identity of producers who comprised production groups, communities, or workshops is out of reach using conventional archaeological data. There has been some success using epidermal prints on artifacts to identify the age and sex of producers. However, while age estimates are well developed, determining the sex of ancient potters is complicated by similarities between the prints of adult women and adolescents of either sex. Forensic research indicates that a combination of ridge breadth and density would best identify the age and sex of individuals. To this end, we propose an identification framework to classify fingerprints grounded in experimental and forensic research. In this study, we classify 38 fingerprints on Early Bronze Age (EB) III pottery from the early urban neighborhood at Tell eṣ-Ṣâfi/Gath, Israel. Mean ridge breadth (MRB) and mean ridge density (MRD) are used to distinguish the age and sex of prints after accounting for the shrinkage of calcareous fabrics used to make four type of vessels. We apply a modified version of the Kamp et al. (1999) regression equation to the MRB for each individual print. The MRD data are correlated to comparable data from populations with appropriate ancestry to infer sex. When the results are combined, our analyses indicate that two thirds of the fingerprints were likely made by adult men and teenage boys and the remainder by adult women and adolescent girls. This result suggests that men or women were not exclusively making pottery at early urban centers in the Levant. This pattern contrasts a fingerprint study of post-state urban pottery production during the EB in northern Mesopotamia, which suggested women no longer made pottery after cities and states were established in the region.

From Stone to Metal: the Dynamics of Technological Change in the Decline of Chipped Stone Tool Production. A Case Study from the Southern Levant (5th–1st Millennia BCE) Abstract The shift from stone to metal has been considered one of the main technological transformations in the history of humankind. In order to observe the dynamics underlying the disappearance of chipped stone tools and their replacement with metal implements, we adopt an approach which combines two different levels of analysis. At the first, by focusing on the Southern Levant as a case study, we consider the developmental forces internal to the technology itself and the conditions favorable to the invention, spread, continuation, or disappearance of technical traits. At the second, by considering specific historical scenarios, we test the existence of general principles which guide technological changes. Flint knapping and metallurgy, and notably their relationship, are particularly appropriate to observe regularities which operate at different scales, the first one within the developmental lines of objects, techniques and technologies, and the second one within the conditions of actualization of technological facts. On the one hand, following the “rules” of technical tendencies, a techno-logic perspective allows observation of how metal cutting objects, overcoming the “limits” of knapping technology, represent the logical development of flint tools. On the other hand, the analysis of the socioeconomic contexts in which chipped stone tools were produced permits identification of regularities which conditioned changes in lithic production systems, their decline, and the final replacement with metal tools.

Single Context, Metacontext, and High Definition Archaeology: Integrating New Standards of Stratigraphic Excavation and Recording Abstract Recently, new augmented recording techniques have entered archaeological fieldwork. We review a major urban excavation in Ribe, Denmark, which has adopted a systematic use of 3D laser scanning and intensive soil and sediment micromorphological sampling as part of the excavation recording practice. Both methods represent a major advance in field documentation, achieving a higher degree of detail and precision for the recording of archaeological features. We argue that these technologies also challenge the current paradigm of single-context recording, i.e. the separation of layers and features as all-encompassing units of recording. First, 3D digital recording implies that contexts are defined in a more definite way than previously, with less flexibility for recursive revision. Second, micromorphology demonstrates how the strata separated in excavation are only a subset of those created in deposition. We call for a new approach, which takes into consideration the fact that excavation units do not always mirror depositional events, as assumed by single-context theory, and that different kinds of observations may not overlap, as assumed in single-context practice. Instead, interfaces, matrices and assemblages are restored as separate units to record and feed into the interpretation cycle. This may be described as recording metacontext: observations that go across or between contexts. We demonstrate how a systematic metacontext registration can lead to a manageable and more detailed excavation record, more faithful to the archaeologists’ observations.

Toward a Social Archaeology of Food for Hunters and Gatherers in Marginal Environments: a Case Study from the Eastern Subarctic of North America Abstract The archaeology of hunters and gatherers has long focused on the economic and technological dimensions of food use and procurement. In marginal environments especially, hunter-gatherer food use has often been situated within an adaptationist calculus of survival and environmental accommodation. The ethnographic record of hunter-gatherers that inhabited such environments, however, indicate that social and cultural considerations also critically informed indigenous peoples’ procurement, consumption, and discard practices. Drawing on the later prehistoric and early historic archaeological record of the island of Newfoundland, in northeastern Canada, this paper explores how the procurement, consumption, and handling of subarctic foods conveyed identity, reflected historical conditions and social relations, factored into ritual and ceremonial practice, and embodied worldviews.

An Experimental Approach to Degrees of Rounding Among Lithic Artifacts Abstract Many Paleolithic lithic collections are found in contexts where post-depositional alterations, such as those made by water streams or sedimentary displacement, have affected the surface of most of the lithic artifacts. A major alteration often observed is the rounding of lithic artifacts. Although there have been some proposals on how to classify degrees of rounding—usually by employing naked eye classifications to determine degrees of rounding—there is a lack of consensus among lithic analysts. The aim of this study is to define and characterize degrees of rounding among lithic artifacts. This characterization also takes into consideration the differential development of alterations and rounding stages, depending on the raw materials. Here, an experimental program has been developed along with supplementary archaeological analysis to define and characterize degrees of rounding. Degrees of rounding are characterized according to three criteria: surface alteration, edge alteration, and width of the ridges. A preliminary characterization and proposal of degrees of rounding is presented. This characterization also takes into consideration the raw materials and the sensibility and resolution of the criteria to establish degrees of rounding. Results show how, after microscopic analysis, lithic artifacts that appear fresh to the naked present different degrees of rounding. The conclusions explain that, although rounding is continuous process, it is possible to establish degrees of rounding, a main initial goal for any lithic analyst.

Vanished Wars of Australia: the Archeological Invisibility of Aboriginal Collective Conflicts Abstract In the debate concerning the existence of collective armed conflict before the advent of agriculture and the emergence of wealth differentiation, Australia—a continent entirely occupied by economic egalitarian foragers until the end of the eighteenth century—provides key insights. We explore the ethnographic data, striving to build a comprehensive database of the collective fights which were recorded. This survey brings a total of 165 events, among which 32 display a comparatively high level of lethality, with ten killed or more, a proportion far from negligible. An examination of each testimony leads to the conclusion that they are, as a whole, likely reliable. We then briefly discuss the nature of these collective conflicts, which purposes are marked by the lack of wealth in Aboriginal societies: the two main proximate causes, by far, are rights over women and retaliation for real or supposed aggressions—notably, conflicts over territories and resources are almost absent. It is also argued that at least some of these conflicts should be qualified as “wars”. Finally, we show why those conflicts leave so few archeological remains, by dealing with art, bones, and material means of conflicts, with a special attention to the “hunting versus war” weapon question. We conclude that if in such technical and social circumstances, these events are fairly difficult to record ethnologically, they are almost (if not totally) invisible archeologically.

Mapping the Adena-Hopewell Landscape in the Middle Ohio Valley, USA: Multi-Scalar Approaches to LiDAR-Derived Imagery from Central Kentucky Abstract Archaeologists around the world have shown that LiDAR has the potential to map a wide range of architectural features built by humans. The ability to map archaeological sites at a landscape scale provides researchers the possibility to reconstruct and assess the ways humans organized, constructed, and interacted with their surroundings. However, LiDAR can be impacted by a variety of modern development and land use practices. In this article, we confront these issues by presenting the first examination of high-resolution LiDAR-derived imagery from Central Kentucky, part of the larger heartland for late-Early and Middle Woodland-era (ca. 300 bc–ad 500) Adena-Hopewell societies. Our investigations demonstrate that multiple issues can arise when analyzing LiDAR imagery for monumental earthen architecture in this region. We outline an integrated strategy to rediscover and confirm the presence of earthen architecture made by Adena-Hopewell societies that incorporates aerial photographs, multi-instrument geophysical surveys, and geoarchaeological methods into the examination of LiDAR imagery. This methodology will be applicable in other global contexts where archaeologists are seeking to rediscover ancient forms of earthen architecture within heavily disturbed or developed landscapes.